Ray Charles

Ray Charles was an American singer songwriter, recording artist and composer called Ray Charles He was a leader in the style of soul songs during the 50s by fusing r & b , gospel , and blues designs into his early records with Atlantic Recording Corporation He also assisted racially incorporate country and pop-music through the 60’s with his cross over success on ABC Records , especially with his Contemporary Sounds records. While with ABC, Charles became one among the initial African American musicians to provided artistic handle by way of a conventional record Frank Sinatra called Charles the only authentic professional in show-business, even though Charles down-played this view.

The influences upon his songs were primarily jazz , blues, r & b and region artists of the day including Art Tatum , Nat King Cole , Louis Jordan , Charles Brown , and Louis Armstrong His playing mirrored influences from region blues , barrelhouse and stride piano designs.

Rolling Rock rated Charles amount ten on their listing of100 Best Artists of All Time; in 2004, and number-two on their November 2008 listing of100 Best Vocalists of All Time;. In honoring Charles, Billy Joel noticed:This might sound like sacrilege , but I believe Ray Charles was more significant than Elvis Early-Life

Ray Charles Robinson was the son of Aretha (William) Robinson, a sharecropper , and Bailey Robinson, a railway repair guy, machinist and handyman. Aretha was a god-fearing Christian and also the household attended the New Shiloh Baptist Church. When Ray was a child, his family moved from Albany, Ga , where he came to be, to poor people black community in the western aspect of Greenville, Fl In his early years, Charles revealed a fascination for mechanical issues and he regularly viewed the locality men operating on their automobiles and farm machines. His musical interest was triggered at Mr. Wiley Pit’s Red Wing Cafe when Pit performed boogie woogie on a vintage upright piano Pit would care for George, Ray’s brother, to be able to get the responsibility off Aretha. Yet, George drowned in Aretha’s laundry bathtub when he was four years of age. After watching the passing of his brother, Ray would feel an overpowering awareness of remorse later on in life.

Charles began to lose his vision at the age of five and went totally blind by the period of seven, seemingly as a result of glaucoma He attended college in the Florida College for the Deaf and the Blind in St. Augustine from 1937 to 1945, where he cultivated his musical gift. Throughout this time he performed on WFOY radio in St. Augustine. His dad died when he was 10, his mum five years afterwards.

In college, Charles was instructed just classical music, however he desired to perform the jazz and blues he observed in your family radio. While at college, he became the college’s highest musician. On Fridays, the South Campus Literary Culture held assemblies where Charles would perform piano and sing well-known tunes. On Halloween and Washington, DC’s birthday, the Coloured Department of the college had socials where Charles would perform. It was here he createdRC Robinson as well as the Store Boys; and sang his own musical arrangement ofJingle Bell Boogie.; He invested his first Xmas in the institution, but after the employees pitched in therefore that Charles could reunite to Greenville, as he did each summertime.